Photos: ‘Sudharma,’ India’s oldest Sanskrit newspaper

Jayalaxmi solves the crossword puzzle in the Sanskrit language daily Sudharma, in Mysuru, Karnataka. Jayalaxmi and her husband Sampath Kumar run Sudharma, India’s oldest surviving Sanskrit newspaper which was started by her father-in-law Varadaraja Iyenger in 1970. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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A view of the first edition of Sudharma, archived at its office in Mysuru. There are more than a hundred publications in Sanskrit in India today but Sudharma, the oldest surviving Sanskrit daily maintains its existence despite a drain on its owners’ resources, according to Nagaraja Rao the chief editor of Sudharma. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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The newspaper was started by Varadaraja Iyenger, in the halls of the Maharaja Samskrit College built by the Wodeyar dynasty. The impulse that drove Iyengar to run a newspaper, say people who knew him, was the same that made him start his printing business: an ancient language had been neglected, and he would right that wrong. The paper, even now, is run on those sentiments. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Prof. Nagaraja Rao discusses the next day’s editorial at the newspaper’s press in Mysuru. Sudharma is the only Sanskrit daily newspaper in India published from Mysore. The printing press began as a simple mud house with vendors refusing to sell it. Iyengar started sending the paper to its readers by post instead. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Sampath Kumar, Iyengar’s son is the current owner of Sudharma. Besides Sudharma, the press also prints bank forms, wedding cards and bill books. “Whatever we earn from our printing press goes into the paper. I promised my father the paper will go on even after he goes. I’ve kept my word,” says Kumar. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Umesh, a worker prepares the offset machine for printing the two page daily newspaper Sudharma at its press. The manpower in the operation is minimal, the infrastructure skeletal. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Workers fold the two-page daily at the press in Mysuru. In this age of high-blitz marketing and visibility, Sudharma –with its nearly 4,000 subscribers-- has stuck to its roots. The newspaper has no marketing team, let alone a marketing budget. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Jayalaxmi, the proprietor of Sudharma at the newspaper’s press. “If a worker falls ill, I take his place to fold the paper and stick the postage stamp on it. It’s a printing press started by a scholar, and a paper run by scholars too,” she says. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Details of subscribers are pasted on an edition before posting. The drive behind a Sanskrit paper also stems from revivalist instincts. Many Sanskritists in Mysuru –where nearly half of its subscribers reside-- are second or third generation descendants of Brahmin priests. The subscriber list of the paper shows that Non-Brahmins and people of other faiths who subscribe to this paper are few. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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The two-page daily newspaper is folded at the press in Mysuru. Ambiguity as editorial strategy is, however, not getting Sudharma any institutional help. No substantial government subsidy has come its way. VD Hegde, a columnist for the paper says, “We are neither rightist nor leftist; we can’t afford to be either.” (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

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Postage stamps are pasted on subscribers’ copies at the press. Sudharma’s existence is an ambition to make Sanskrit the language of everyday experiences. Its pages provide the ordinary reader a chance to wrest control of a language that has been the exclusive domain of the pundits. (Arijit Sen / HT Photo)

about the gallery

For over 40 years, Sudharma, a Sanskrit daily in Mysuru has survived battling lack of manpower, dwindling funds, sceptics and the death of its language.